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(MADISON, WI) — Just hours after the state Supreme Court rejected Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul’s effort to block Elon Musk from handing out $1 million checks on Sunday night, the billionaire took the stage at a town hall in Green Bay and gave away two $1 million checks to attendees in his latest effort to support conservative candidate Brad Schimel.

Urging the crowd to back Schimel, Musk cast Tuesday as “a vote for which party controls the House of Representatives” and implied “the future of civilization” is at stake.

One of the recipients of a large, showy check, Nicholas Jacobs, is the chair of the Wisconsin College Republicans.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s order came just minutes before the event was set to start.

Notably, the court also rejected a bid from Musk’s lawyers to ask two justices, who had campaigned for Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Susan Crawford, to recuse themselves.

The ruling came after an appeals court on Saturday denied Kaul’s emergency motion to stop the giveaway from taking place.

Kaul wrote in his initial filing on Friday that he was asking for emergency relief to stop Musk and America PAC “from further promoting a million-dollar giveaway to attendees of a planned event on Sunday, March 30, 2025, and prohibiting Respondents from making any payments to Wisconsin electors to vote.”

However, the judge assigned to the case, the Honorable Columbia County Circuit Court Judge W. Andrew Voigt, refused to hear the lawsuit before Sunday’s Green Bay rally with Musk — prompting Kaul’s emergency motion asking a Court of Appeals to take action.

After that emergency motion was rejected, Kaul appealed to the Wisconsin Supreme Court to step in on Sunday.

Lawyers for Elon Musk and America PAC then filed motions for the recusal of Wisconsin Supreme Court Justices Rebecca Frank Dallet and Jill J. Karofsky.

They argued that because Dallet and Karofsky campaigned for Crawford, and Crawford has been critical of Musk, “to avoid any potential perceptions of bias and manifestations of possible bias, Justices Dallet and Karofsky should decline to participate in consideration of this matter.”

The lawyers also framed the planned Sunday night giveaways as “spokesperson agreements” for spokespeople for the PAC.

In the initial lawsuit, shared by Kaul’s office, Kaul argued that “Musk’s announcement of his intention to pay $1 million to two Wisconsin electors who attend his event on Sunday night, specifically conditioned on their having voted in the upcoming April 3, 2025, Wisconsin Supreme Court election, is a blatant attempt to violate” state law, which “forbids anyone from offering or promising to give anything of value to an elector in order to induce the elector to go to the polls, vote or refrain from voting, or vote for a particular person.”

The suit asked for a restraining order “prohibiting Defendants from any further promotion of the million-dollar gifts to attendees of the planned Sunday March 30, 2025,” as well as a temporary restraining order “prohibiting Defendants from making any payments to Wisconsin electors to vote,” and injunctive relief to “restrain and prohibit all actions by Defendants taken in furtherance of a planned violation” of the state law.

In addition to presenting the checks on Sunday night, Musk said his PAC is launching a “Block Captain” program ahead of the election on Tuesday, where participants will make $20 for each picture they post of someone with a Schimel sign and a thumbs up outside of their home.

So far, two political groups aligned with Musk — America PAC and Building America’s Future — have poured nearly $20 million into supporting Schimel for the open seat.

The world’s richest man has used cash giveaways in the past, including a controversial $1 million sweepstakes offered to voters in swing states during last year’s election cycle as part of an effort to boost President Donald Trump’s chances of winning in those states.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court election, on Tuesday, has generally become the center of a political firestorm, and has become the most expensive state supreme court race in American history, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.

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(NEW YORK) — Inflation held steady in February compared to a year ago, according to a release from the Federal Reserve’s preferred gauge of price increases.

The reading matched economists’ expectations.

Consumer prices climbed 2.5% in February compared to a year ago, registering at a level slightly higher than the Fed’s target rate of 2%, Commerce Department data on Friday showed.

Core inflation — a closely watched measure that strips out volatile food and energy prices — increased 2.8% over the year ending in February, ticking lower from the previous month, data showed.

The fresh data arrives little more than a week after the Fed opted to leave interest rates unchanged.

Speaking at a press conference after the rate decision, Fed Chair Jerome Powell faulted President Donald Trump’s tariffs for a “good part” of recent inflation. The central bank predicted weaker year-end economic growth and higher inflation than it had in a December forecast.

Consumer surveys show rising fears about inflation as Trump imposes tariffs on top trading partners and key industries.

Economists widely expect tariffs to raise prices because importers typically pass along a share of the tax burden to consumers in the form of higher costs.

Trump announced this week plans to slap 25% tariffs on all imported cars, escalating a global trade war and eliciting criticism from leaders in Canada and Europe. The duties came on the heels of tariffs on steel and aluminum, as well as levies on goods from China, Canada and Mexico.

The Commerce Department data for February covers a period that largely precedes Trump’s tariffs, though the reading arrives amid a bout of accelerating inflation that stretches back to the final months of the Biden administration.

Prince increases fell dramatically from a peak of more than 9% in 2022, but sped up slightly at the end of last year.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — U.S. stocks ticked higher on Thursday in the first trading since President Donald Trump announced 25% auto tariffs.

The tariffs have escalated a global trade war and prompted forecasts of higher car prices.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 20 points, or 0.05%, while the S&P 500 increased 0.25% on Thursday morning. The tech-heavy Nasdaq jumped 0.25%.

Shares of major U.S. automakers dropped in early trading. General Motors dropped more than 6%, while Ford fell nearly 2%. Stellantis — the parent company of Jeep and Chrysler — declined 1%.

Tesla, the electric carmaker led by Trump-advisor Elon Musk, bucked the trend. Shares of Tesla climbed 5.5% in early trading on Thursday.

The 25% tariffs will be applied to imported passenger vehicles, including cars, SUVs, minivans, cargo vans and light trucks, according to a White House fact sheet released after Trump’s Oval Office remarks on Wednesday. The tariffs will take effect on April 3.

The tariffs will also be applied to key imported auto parts, including engines, powertrain parts and electrical components.

The auto tariffs are set to target a sector that employs more than a million U.S. workers and relies on a supply chain intricately intertwined with Mexico and Canada. Tariffs placed on the auto industry risk raising car prices for U.S. consumers, experts previously told ABC News.

Ferrari may raise U.S. prices as much as 10% in response to the tariffs, the company said in a statement on Thursday. Dan Ives, a managing director of equity research at the investment firm Wedbush, predicted general tariff-related price increases of between $5,000 and $10,000 per vehicle.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Wednesday called the measure “a direct attack on our workers.” The Canadian government plans to review its trade options, Carney said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Wednesday expressed “regret” about the decision to impose auto tariffs. “We will now assess this announcement, together with other measures the US is envisaging in the next days,” von der Leyen said in a statement.

Early Thursday morning, Trump warned of retaliatory tariffs if officials in Canada and Europe move forward with countermeasures.

“If the European Union works with Canada in order to do economic harm to the USA, large scale Tariffs, far larger than currently planned, will be placed on them both in order to protect the best friend that each of those two countries has ever had!” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — U.S. stocks slid on Thursday in the first trading since President Donald Trump announced 25% auto tariffs, escalating a global trade war and prompting forecasts of higher car prices.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 250 points, or 0.5%, while the S&P 500 dropped 0.5%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq declined 0.6%.

Shares of major U.S. automakers plunged in early trading. General Motors dropped more than 8%, while Ford fell nearly 3%. Stellantis — the parent company of Jeep and Chrysler — declined 4%.

Tesla, the electric carmaker led by Trump-advisor Elon Musk, bucked the trend. Shares of Tesla ticked up 1.5% in early trading on Thursday.

The 25% tariffs will be applied to imported passenger vehicles, including cars, SUVs, minivans, cargo vans and light trucks, according to a White House fact sheet released after Trump’s Oval Office remarks. The tariffs will take effect on April 3.
The tariffs will also be applied to key imported auto parts, including engines, powertrain parts and electrical components.

The auto tariffs are set to target a sector that employs more than a million U.S. workers and relies on a supply chain intricately intertwined with Mexico and Canada.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Wednesday called the measure “a direct attack on our workers.” The Canadian government plans to review its trade options, Carney said.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(WASHINGTON) — Republicans accused public media outlets NPR and PBS of bias at a House subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, while Democrats defended the organizations and criticized the event as a distraction from the ongoing controversy regarding the Trump administration’s use the Signal messaging app for the communication of sensitive information.

PBS President and CEO Paula Kerger and NPR President and CEO Katherine Maher rebutted allegations of bias, saying the outlets abide by journalistic standards and serve a diverse audience that includes rural viewers.

The hearing, titled “Anti-American Airwaves: Holding the Heads of NPR and PBS Accountable,” was held by the Delivering on Government Efficiency (DOGE) subcommittee, the name of which echoes the Department of Government Efficiency, the Trump administration’s cost-cutting initiative overseen by Elon Musk.

House Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., criticized NPR and PBS during the hearing for alleged liberal bias, pointing to federal funding for the outlets as the target of potential cuts.

“NPR and PBS have increasingly become radical, left-wing echo chambers for a narrow audience of mostly wealthy, white, urban liberals and progressives,” Greene said.

Minutes later, House Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Ma., defended the public media outlets and criticized the hearing as a distraction for more important issues often taken up by the House Oversight Committee, the larger body to which the DOGE subcommittee belongs.

“I’m sad to see this once proud committee — the principle investigative committee in the House of Representatives — has now stooped to the lowest levels of partisanship and political theater to hold a hearing to go after the likes of Elmo and Cookie Monster and Arthur the aardvark,” Lynch said.

Later in the hearing, Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Ca., said sarcastically: “Is Elmo now, or has he ever been, a member of the Communist Party?”

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — President Donald Trump has vowed to issue a fresh round of tariffs on April 2, presenting it as an inflection point for the economy weeks after a previous set of duties roiled markets and incited recession fears.

Trump has repeatedly referred to April 2 as “liberation day,” saying a wide-ranging slate of reciprocal tariffs would rebalance U.S. trade relationships.

Trump’s plan for reciprocal tariffs next week, however, is expected to be narrower than he previously vowed, though the plan remains under discussion, sources told ABC News this week.

The news of a potentially softer approach to forthcoming tariffs rallied U.S. stocks earlier this week, recovering some of the losses suffered earlier in March.

While key details remain unknown, new duties would ratchet up the global trade war, raising prices for an array of consumer goods and risking an economic slowdown, experts told ABC News.

“This certainly will be an escalation,” Mary Lovely, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics who studies trade policy, told ABC News. “We know the direction of travel, if not how far this will go.”

Here’s what the latest round of tariffs could mean for prices and the economy, according to experts:

Will the tariffs on April 2 raise prices?
In setting tariffs for April 2, the U.S. will target countries that have major trade imbalances with the U.S., sources said.

“It’s 15% of the countries, but it’s a huge amount of our trading volume,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said last week, describing the countries as a “Dirty 15.”

Last year, according to federal census data, the U.S. had its biggest trade deficits with China, the European Union, Mexico, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Canada and India, among other nations.

Reciprocal tariffs could raise prices for imported goods from those countries, since importers typically pass along a share of the tax burden to consumers.

The tariffs could hike prices for furniture and consumer electronics from Vietnam, fresh fruits and vegetables from Mexico, and cars from South Korea, experts told ABC News.

“This is going to mean prices will ultimately go up,” Jason Miller, a professor of supply chain management at Michigan State University, told ABC News.

The scale of price increases will likely depend on the tariff rate set by the Trump administration, which remains unclear, the experts said.

Speaking at the White House on Monday, Trump said the reciprocal tariffs could fall short of the rate that target countries impose on U.S. goods.

“I may give a lot of countries breaks,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “I’m embarrassed to charge them what they’ve charged us.”

Kyle Handley, a professor of economics at the University of California, San Diego, said he expects consumer prices to rise enough for consumers to identify the change.

“Depending on what tariff rates they put in place, it could be pretty massive,” Handley said. “It will be a non-trivial increase in the price of imports. People will notice.”

What do the tariffs on April 2 mean for the economy?
Experts told ABC News the fresh tariffs would put downward pressure on U.S. economic growth, since the additional tax burden for importing businesses and uncertainty about additional duties could deter private sector investment.

“A lot of the uncertainty about tariffs very likely has firms sort of frozen in place as they’re waiting to evaluate and see what happens,” Miller said.

Looming tariffs also risk unease among shoppers, threatening to undermine a key engine of the U.S. economy, some experts said. Consumer attitudes worsened more than expected in March, dropping to their lowest levels since 2021, a Conference Board survey on Tuesday showed.

Consumer spending, which accounts for about two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, could weaken if shopper sentiment sours, Bret Kenwell, U.S. investment analyst at eToro, told ABC News in a statement.

By some key measures, however, the economy remains in solid shape. A recent jobs report showed steady hiring last month and a historically low unemployment rate. Inflation stands well below a peak attained in 2022, though price increases register nearly a percentage point higher than the Fed’s goal of 2%.

Still, recession fears are mounting on Wall Street as businesses and consumers weather the trade war. Goldman Sachs earlier this month hiked its odds of a recession from 15% to 20%. Moody’s Analytics pegged the chances of a recession over the next year at 35%.

“These tariffs will be very detrimental for economic performance and business growth,” Handley said. “It may not take long for us to start seeing some of those effects.”

ABC News’ Selina Wang contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — New Mega Millions rules will come into play next month, the company has announced, under which the minimum jackpot value will more than double to $50 million.

The new rules will come into force after the final drawing of the current game on Friday, April 4, the company said in a notice posted to its website. The first drawing under the new rules will be on April 8.

From that draw, jackpots will start at $50 million, rather than the current starting point of $20 million. “Jackpots are expected to grow faster and get to higher dollar amounts more frequently in the new game,” the company said.

Minimum non-jackpot prizes will jump in value from between $2 and $1 million to between $10 and $10 million. Every winning ticket will payout at least double the price, Mega Millions said.

Mega Millions will introduce a new $5 game with a built-in multiplier, with a multiplier value of 2, 3, 4, 5 or 10 randomly assigned at the time of purchase.

Prizes for match 5 — achieved by matching five white balls — will range from $2 million to $10 million with the new multiplier.

Matching the Mega Ball on its own will now payout $10 to $50, depending on the assigned multiplier.

Mega Millions said the new rules improve the odds of players winning the jackpot — from 1 in 302,575,350 to 1 in 290,472,336 — due to the removal of one gold Mega Ball from the game. The new format will have 24 rather than 25 Mega Balls.

Overall odds of winning any prize will improve to 1 in 23 from 1 in 24, the company said.

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(NEW YORK) — With more high-rise buildings than anywhere else in the U.S., New York City has long been a place where millions of people hope to achieve the American dream through careers in the construction industry.

While scores of construction workers are spending hours each day building the city’s newest apartment buildings, office towers and restaurants from the ground up, these properties have also become the locations of the city’s latest fraud scheme, according to some representatives of the construction and insurance industries.

“It isn’t a victimless crime,” Don Orlando of Tradesman Program Managers, which represents property owners and construction contractors, told ABC News. “These are small businesses that are getting victimized.”

Orlando alleges that hundreds of construction site incidents involving reported injuries were actually staged as part of a widespread conspiracy — and he said surveillance cameras are capturing some of these alleged fraudulent falls.

He pointed to a video that he says shows a man who “didn’t fall” and “just sat down” while an ambulance was on its way. The man filed a lawsuit claiming head and limb injuries, according to Orlando.

“That $200 or $300 investment in that camera saved that employer millions of dollars,” Orlando said.

Others said these claims are being blown out of proportion.

“If there was this rampant fraud going on, these cases would be dismissed by a judge or a jury,” New York personal injury attorney Nicholas Warywoda told ABC News. “That’s just not happening.”

‘The cost of doing work skyrockets’

Steve Katz has worked in the construction industry in the New York metropolitan area for more than 50 years, but said the last few years have been unlike anything he has ever experienced.

According to Katz, his concerns over fraud started eight years ago when one of his employees claimed to have fallen from a fire escape. After doctors said the employee was fine and could return to work, the man never came back, according to Katz, adding that his insurance company settled for $3.6 million.

“That’s when I went crazy,” Katz said. “I found out that I wasn’t the only one. My competitors told me they were all getting hit with these fake falls.”

Two years later, Katz said another construction worker sued him, alleging a fall on one of the properties where Katz’s crews were working. However, Katz said the employee’s colleagues told him that the employee told them that he was planning the fall in advance and was willing to teach them how to fake falls as well.

“Since then, I’ve had a total of eight of these phony lawsuits,” Katz said, adding that the extensive costs associated with fraudulent claims are being passed along to customers.

“We just raise our rates. The insurance companies raise their rates, and the cost of doing work skyrockets.”

Orlando explained that fraudulent construction accident cases can have financial implications for insurance customers throughout the U.S., even outside the nation’s largest city.

“If this was true, then why are the insurance companies not showing the proof that it’s actually lawsuits that are raising premiums and insurance costs?” Warywoda, whose firm frequently represents construction workers injured on construction sites in New York, said.

“One could say if the owners of the construction sites would just provide the appropriate safety measures that they’re required to, there wouldn’t be as many lawsuits,” he added.

One address, multiple lawsuits

Allegations of widespread fraud have caused increased scrutiny on lawsuits being filed by people claiming to be construction workers who were hurt on job sites.

In New York City’s outer boroughs, miles from the high-rise towers of Midtown Manhattan, reporting by ABC station WABC-TV found some claims coming from multiple people living at the same address.

One apartment building in the Bronx was home to 30 plaintiffs, while a two-story building nearby was listed as the home of 21 plaintiffs, according to WABC-TV’s report. In Queens, at least half a dozen people living in a six-unit apartment building said in court documents that they were injured on the job at construction sites.

“If you think about it, the law of averages tells you it’s really unlikely that there’s going to be this large number of people living at the same address, who are all in the same business, work for the same employer, have the same injury, have the same medical treatment and are going through the exact same things,” Michelle Rafield, the executive editor for Coalition Against Insurance Fraud, told ABC News.

Orlando’s company, Tradesman, claimed undocumented migrants are being recruited to participate in the scheme.

“They’re told, ‘Listen, we can teach you how to make millions. This is all you have to do. You have to fake a fall on a construction site,'” Katz said.

Katz and Orlando claim that some doctors and lawyers are in on the scheme, and that after the construction accidents are reported, the migrants undergo unnecessary surgeries and then become plaintiffs in slip-and-fall lawsuits

“I would call the plaintiffs in this case victims, because they are the ones being taken advantage of,” Orlando said.

Tradesman has now filed lawsuits of its own, taking over 100 defendants, including law firms and doctors, to federal court on accusations of racketeering.

“It’s morally wrong,” Orlando said. “Take out the fraud element. You’re taking advantage of someone who’s deprived as it is, and America is supposed to be the land of opportunities.”

Attorneys for dozens of the defendants say the allegations have no merit and that they intend to seek dismissals of the claims against them.

“The insurance industry and the industry lobby is very wealthy and very strong. They’re doing everything they can to tarnish and to change the civil justice system, which is only going to make it less safe for construction workers,” Warywoda, who isn’t among those accused in Trademan’s lawsuits, said. “It’s about putting profits over people.”

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(NEW YORK) — Consumer attitudes worsened in March as President Donald Trump’s tariffs set off a market rout and warnings of a possible recession, Conference Board survey data on Tuesday showed. Sentiment worsened more than economists expected.

The fresh data on consumer sentiment arrives a week before the onset of additional U.S. tariffs, indicating potential fear of further escalation in an ongoing global trade war.

Trump has repeatedly referred to April 2 as “liberation day,” saying a wide-ranging slate of reciprocal tariffs would rebalance U.S. trade relationships.

Trump’s plan for reciprocal tariffs next week, however, is expected to be more targeted and narrower than he previously vowed, though the plan remains under discussion, sources told ABC News on Monday. The administration is focused on trading partners who have major trade imbalances with the U.S., the sources said.

The news of a potentially softer approach to forthcoming tariffs rallied U.S. stocks on Monday, recovering some of the losses suffered earlier this month.

Consumer sentiment appears to align with dampening expectations at the Federal Reserve. Last week, the Fed predicted weaker year-end economic growth and higher inflation than it had in a December forecast.

Speaking at a press conference in Washington, D.C., last Wednesday, Fed Chair Jerome Powell faulted tariffs for a “good part” of recent inflation.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
 

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(WASHINGTON) — Boeing is seeking to withdraw its guilty plea agreement with the Department of Justice in the criminal cases surrounding two deadly 737 MAX crashes, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.

The agreement blamed the aerospace giant for misleading the Federal Aviation Administration before the two crashes in October 2018 and March 2019 that killed 346 people in total.

Boeing is seeking more lenient treatment from President Donald Trump’s administration and the DOJ is considering modifying aspects of the plea agreement, the sources said.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report the news.

The initial plea agreement was rejected by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor in December 2024, who cited the government’s diversity, equity and inclusion policies as a factor in the selection of an independent compliance monitor for Boeing.

According to the most recent court filing, the two parties will continue to meet and negotiate and must notify the court by April 11 on how they plan to proceed forward.

Boeing declined to comment to ABC News and referred the question to the DOJ.

“Boeing got one of the most lenient deferred prosecution agreements in American history,” said Paul Cassell, a lawyer representing some families of the MAX crash victims. “The idea that after they breached that agreement, they get another opportunity to avoid acknowledging what it’s done seems, to me, to be wishful thinking on the part of Boeing.”

The first crash on Oct. 29, 2018, in Jakarta, Indonesia, killed all 189 passengers and crew. The second crash, on March 10, 2019, happened in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, when a Boeing aircraft crashed minutes after takeoff and killed 157 people onboard.

Both crashes preceded the Alaska Airlines incident in Jan. 2024, when a door plug fell out of the fuselage of a Boeing 737 Max 9, a newer model, after departure.

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